Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)

A young man steals a boat to find his brother, but he and his shipmates become shipwrecked on a mysterious island inhabited by a giant sea monster and a slumbering Godzilla.

Director:

Jun Fukuda

Writer:

Shin'ichi Sekizawa

Stars:

Akira Takarada, Kumi Mizuno, Chôtarô Tôgin

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Akira Takarada	...	Yoshimura
Kumi Mizuno	...	Daiyo
Chôtarô Tôgin	...	Ichino
Hideo Sunazuka	...	Nita
Tôru Ibuki	...	Yata Kane
Akihiko Hirata	...	Captain Yamoto
Jun Tazaki	...	Red Bamboo Commander
Tôru Watanabe	...	Ryôta Kane
Ikio Sawamura	...	Elderly Slave
Pair Bambi	...	Mothra's Little Beauties
Hideyo Amamoto	...	Red Bamboo Naval Officer
Hisaya Itô	...	Red Bamboo Scientist #1
Tadashi Okabe	...	Red Bamboo Scientist #2
Kazuo Suzuki	...	Escaped Slave
Shôichi Hirose	...	Escaped Slave

Storyline

Some teenagers want to obtain a boat to find a brother. When they look around a boat without permission, they find a thief who takes them on his escape. They are caught in a storm and arrive at Letchi Island where natives of Infant Island have been enslaved by the terrorist organisation Red Bamboo. Red Bamboo runs a heavy water factory to process a juice which holds off the monster, Ebirah, which otherwise traps them on the island. The young men meet beautiful but tough Daiyo and wake up Godzilla to put an end to the Red Bamboo.

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Plot Keywords:

godzilla character | psychotronic film | island | boat | monster | 

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Taglines:

This is one lobster you don't want to order!

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Genres:

Action | Adventure | Drama | Sci-Fi

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated PG for sci-fi monster violence

Details

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese

Release Date:

1969 (USA)

Also Known As:

Godzilla, Mothra, and Ebira, Horror of the Deep

Box Office

Budget:

$1,200,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Toho Company

Technical Specs

Runtime:

87 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Eastmancolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Japan Import DVD has Super-8mm version (Japanese Audio), as a special feature.

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Goofs

Strings holding up various parts of the monsters, like Ebirah's claw, visible at parts.

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Quotes

Ichino: Is breaking in really that easy?
Yoshimura: Only amateurs think that.

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Crazy Credits

For the Columbia/Tri-Star U.S. DVD release, which uses the original uncut Japanese version, the English language credits list the noted composer Masaru Sato as "Mararu Sato."

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Alternate Versions

The original version featured a couple of scenes in which Ryota first goes to the Maritime Safety Office and then to a newspaper reporter to ask for help in locating Yata. It is while he is at the newspaper office that Ryota sees a poster on the wall about the dance contest.

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Connections

Spoofs Sir Galahad in Campus (1961)

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Soundtracks

Samashite Mosura
(Mothra Awake)
Written and Arranged by Masaru Satô
Performed by Pair Bambi

User Reviews

Big G was the weakest part of this movie

Almost all Kaiju flicks involve two story lines, the story of the little guys and the story of the monsters. This is one of them where the story of the little guys is what really matters. A distinctly B movie, half-espionage and half-island-action, about a guy's search for his brother and getting caught up with a gang of various other guys and a beautiful native to stave off an organization's evil deeds in the South pacific. Pretty scenery. Pretty natives. Some fair jokes and some good 1960's style cheese action. Even Ebirah, a jumbo jumbo shrimp who guards the island, more or less, works well enough as a background piece. It is when the big piece of seafood tries to take center stage that things start slowing down.

By the time Godzilla shows up, the movie suffers from the monsters. Not only does the original Japanese soundtrack have a habit of playing just about the most inappropriate music for all of his scenes (look, jets are coming, let's play surf rock...he's smashing a base, let's play slow horror mood music); but there is the distinct problem the director has in getting the transition from Godzilla as a monster to a potential hero down right. Too often, Godzilla's actions make no sense. He seems to like people in one scene. In the next, he is randomly destroying things again.

The movies final problem is the Kaiju fights sort of repeat themselves. Whether it be the two monsters throwing rocks back and forth more than once, or the exact same "flip" later on, it does seem a little out of place.